This is War [ONC 2021] // Honourable Mention

Chapter Nine - Daniel

"Fix!"

Daniel clipped his bayonet onto the end of his rifle, his hands shook. He glanced down the line at the other men, all of them fixing their bayonet but none of them looked as scared as he felt. Not even Henry and he was three years younger. Instead, Henry had a hardness on his face, a determination to follow orders to the letter regardless of what might be on the end of the bayonet come the end of the charge. After only a month, everyone had started to become hardened to the idea of killing. Everyone except Daniel.

"You will charge on my whistle!"

Next to him, Tommy touched his left pocket where he kept his Bible, a small and almost unnoticeable gesture. Daniel readjusted his grip on his rifle so it sat better in his hand, his finger inching towards the trigger even though this was a bayonet charge and he wouldn't need it. Still, he felt an almost comfort in knowing that he didn't have to go with the bayonet if he didn't want, the trigger would always be an option.

The officer's whistle echoed through the field. Daniel followed the other men in a dead sprint across the field with their bayonets aimed in front of them. Not a footstep could be heard as the group crossed the field and reached the other side, all of them raising their rifles a little higher so their bayonet could hit the target spot. He followed them and raised his rifle, but he didn't raise it high enough. His bayonet just missed the target point.

All of the other men stepped back to look at the hole their bayonet had made in the sack of straw that had been their target practice. Everyone else had managed to hit the centre of the painted X, everyone that is, except Daniel. His bayonet had hit just above the mark, in a place that wouldn't have done much damage were they in a real combat situation. Daniel sighed and dropped his gun, looking at the mark on the sack.

"That would still put a man down, you know. You'd just need to get him a second time to kill him" Tommy said, looking at Daniel's sack.

"Private Morris!" the commanding officer yelled. "You are the only one to not hit the target! Do you want to kill the Huns?"

"Yes, Sir!" Daniel called back.

"Then you better sharpen up! I won't have one of my men making a mockery of the British Armed Forces." The officer turned to the rest of the men. "I want you all back here for two where we'll be running the drill again! If Private Morris doesn't hit the target, then it's a six-mile run for the lot of you! Understood?"

"Yes, Sir!" the men yelled.

"Fallout!"

Daniel joined the men as they left the rifle training area and headed towards the mess hall for something to eat. Several of the men grumbled about not wanting to go for a six-mile run all because one man kept missing the target, but he tried to ignore them. In the month since training had started, Daniel had kept mainly to himself and only spoke to the men he shared a tent with. All of them were better at training then he was and oftentimes spent the evenings playing cards whilst Daniel did extra drills to try and keep up.

Unlike the other men, his heart wasn't in the war. He couldn't see himself piercing someone through the heart with his bayonet, especially as he would be close enough to watch the light drain from their eyes. Daniel didn't want to listen to the screams and cries of dying men on the battlefield, he didn't want to see his friends die right in front of him. Except he didn't have a choice.

He couldn't just leave without being called a deserter and being shot for cowardice and he knew he couldn't go to an active battlefield and expect not to have to fire his weapon or spear someone through the chest. Although he didn't have the heart of war and death, he didn't have much of a choice anymore.

"I wonder what it will be like to actually stab a hun," Arthur asked, turning his head to look back at the sacks of straw.

"Don't know; do you reckon we'll get to find out?" Tommy said.

Arthur shrugged. "War might be over by the time we finish training. Especially if Daniel's got anything to do with it. We'll be running bayonet charges until next September if he doesn't pull his socks up."

"I overheard the Major saying the army in Belgium has dug in. Both sides are in trenches so I doubt anyone's getting close to the enemy. Not at the moment, anyway," George said.

"I still think the war will be over before we even get there with Morris in our Battalion ."

Daniel lagged behind the other men as they headed towards the mess hall for something to eat before afternoon drills. The group were too busy racing each other inside to notice that he had stopped moving altogether and instead stood in the middle of the training ground. With the mess hall in front of him and the rifle training area behind him, Daniel had to decide whether to sacrifice a little something to eat to perfect his bayonet technique or send the entire Battalion on a six-mile run because he couldn't hit the mark.

He turned back towards the sacks of straw and left the mess hall behind him, ignoring the rumbling in his stomach and instead focusing all of his attention on the mark on the bag and the end of his bayonet. Even if his heart wasn't in the war, he wouldn't see the entire Battalion suffer because of his nerves. Even if he had to spend the entire night working, he didn't want to be the weakest member of the Battalion and resolved to work much harder to be on par with everyone else, especially Henry who had been showing everyone else up since day one.

"Private Morris! What do you think you're doing?" Captain Brooks yelled.

"Practicing the bayonet drill. It's like you said, Sir, I need to sharpen up." He looked back towards Captain Brooks, wondering if he was about to get court-martialed for being insubordinate.

"Good work, man. This is the sort of dedication we expect from members of the British Armed Forces."

With that, Captain Brooks turned and walked towards the mess hall, leaving Daniel alone in the training area with nothing but his rifle and a sack of straw for company. 

~~~

First Published - February 18th, 2021